It's in the cards
by Maddie's Lullaby
Summary: Bucky agrees to follow his sister into a psychic's, not realizing just how much of her he'd be seeing. Perhaps some good came out of that.


**It's in the cards**

"C'mon Buck!" His little sister whined, pulling on his hand.

It was a beautiful day and Bucky had agreed on accompanying Becca on a Coney Island boardwalk stroll. He obviously hadn't realized how much of a headache that would end up being. He rolled his eyes at the shack before him. Unlike all the other shops and restaurants, this one looked dark and he could smell the incense burning inside. The door wasn't as much a door as it was a heavy purple curtain embroidered in golden patterns. There was a porch with a table and two chairs, all empty. The sign hanging above the entrance read "Esma's Psychic Readings."

"You know this is all bull, right?"

"No, it isn't!" She hissed defensively. "Dottie Myrtle went to one last month, she told her she would meet the love of her life soon, and a week later she started dating Archie Strumming!"

Bucky sighed. On one hand, he wasn't really interested in whatever scam was going on inside, but his sister was a stubborn girl and they would just end up arguing for the next half hour before he caved.

"Fine! But we'll be in and out!"

"That's not for you to decide, is it?" Becca shot back, a defiant gleam in her blue eyes.

She went in first, leaving him outside before he finally followed her in.

The shack was exactly like he had imagined it. Dark and lit dimly by some candles and a few Arabic looking mosaic lamps hanging here and there, herbs and oils in jars on the shelves, incense burning in a corner, an exit covered by a bead curtain in the very back of the room, and in the middle, a little round table with four chairs around it. The only thing he wasn't expecting was the girl sitting at one of the chairs. Bucky had an image of a middle-aged woman with greying hair and heavy skirts, and maybe even a turban or a shawl, but she was around his age, dressed just like his sister or neighbors would. She smiled at both of them and beaconed them in.

"Well, come on in you two, don't be shy!"

She had a slight accent to her pleasant voice. Her skin was rather fair, her hair cascaded in heavy black curls down her shoulders, and both her arms were covered with colorful bangles and bracelets. However, it wasn't until Bucky sat down that he noticed her stormy gray eyes framed with eyelashes that went on for miles.

"Welcome. I am Esma."

Becca was practically jumping up and down on her chair. Esma let out a chuckle before getting up and exiting. She came back a short while later, with two steaming cups that she set in front of them. Bucky eyed his warily.

"It's only tea. What kind of host would I be if I did not even offer my guests something to drink," she said, amused.

Shrugging, Bucky took a sip to be polite. It was strong yet smooth and soothing, and soon, he saw himself reaching for it again. Esma sat down again, a deck of cards in her hands.

"Since the young lady here looks rather impatient, I assume the reading is for her?"

"Yes!" Becca agreed, her smile practically splitting her face in two.

"Well, let's see what the cards have to say here."

She shuffled them for a second before laying two rows of three on the table in front of her. They weren't like anything Bucky had seen before. Sure, he had seen psychics reading people's futures on cards before, but all their decks seemed printed and they all looked the same. These ones, however, looked like small watercolor paintings of animals and people, and it looked like Esma had made them herself.

"You have traveled from far recently, haven't you?" The psychic asked, still looking at the cards before her. "And you will be again in a short while."

"I go to boarding school across the country," Becca nodded.

"I see. You miss your family very much, and you wish you were closer. But I also see that you try not to show it. You are grateful for the opportunity, so you show a strong face. And you are stubborn, and bossy."

Bucky snorted, making the psychic look up with a slight smirk. It occurred to him that it was the first sound he had made in the presence of Esma.

"I am not bossy! Am I?"

"Never met anyone bossier," her brother answered.

"There are some tensions in your relationships at the moment. However, the issue is not with them but with you. As long as you don't achieve inner balance and calm, you will not be able to solve that tension."

Becca's cheeks turned a bit red, which caused Bucky to raise an eyebrow. He knew there was a reason she wanted to go in, and a potential secret boyfriend was possible. He'd probably tease her later.

"Interestingly enough, this card also might mean that a close friend or a relative is in law enforcement or in the military," Esma pondered, looking directly at Bucky. "I hope it doesn't in this case, there are talks of a draft."

He bit the inside of his cheek to keep his face from betraying him. He was thinking of enlisting. Both him and Steve were. Maybe she wasn't bogus after all. No, that was ridiculous. How could a bunch of cards predict that?

Esma finished her reading by saying that, while Becca would go through a period of pain and loss, that she would eventually find peace and happiness. She grabbed both their empty tea cups, and got up to dispose of them, but stopped in her tracks, her brow furrowing.

"What's wrong?" Becca asked, definitely a bit worried after her reading.

"Nothing. It's just that… In Turkey, we read tea leaves. And these are… quite strange. It tells me of death and resurrection. A travel far from here, to a place much, much colder and scarier, but also of friendship that transcends time, space, and soul."

When she looked up and saw the teenager's face, however, the lines on her forehead smoothed up, and she gave her a reassuring smile.

"Take this with a grain of salt. My aunt has always been better at reading these. I was never good at it, to be fully honest."

This seemed to reassure her and after thanking Esma, she left the shack. Bucky stayed behind and payed the psychic for her services. As he was about to follow Becca out, he hesitated before turning around.

"You were lying, weren't you," he asked. "When you said you weren't good at reading tea leaves."

The look on her face told him he was right. He gave her a little nod and left.

_oOo_

Freshly enlisted, Bucky was walking down the boardwalk, enjoying the last few rays of sunshine before he had to ship out to rainy old Britain.

"Would you look at that! Back so soon?"

Esma was smiling at him. She was sitting at the table he'd seen on her porch when he had gone in with Becca, except this time she was wearing a long colorful dress and a scarf on her head. A sign showed that she was doing palm readings for a quarter.

"Care for a reading?"

"You know I don't believe in all of this, doll."

"Well, something tells me you know I am not a fraud."

She wasn't wrong. So, Bucky shrugged, and sat down.

"I'm Bucky, by the way. I realize I never introduced myself last time."

"It's quite alright. My patrons rarely do. Give me your hand, Bucky."

He obliged, and Esma grabbed his much bigger hand in both hers. She was really pretty, he realized as he looked at her while she was focused on his palm. The sound of her voice brought him back.

"Well, this is strange. I see traveling, just like in the tea cup. Quite a lot of it actually. But it's… not really you."

"What do you mean?"

"I am not sure. It seems to me like it's quite like, ah… how do you say in English… an out of body experience? You will live a long, very long life. It looks interrupted in parts, especially at one point where it seems to stop and keep going later, but it will still be quite long. And I see pain, suffering, but eventually, I see happiness at the end of the tunnel. And a love that will save you."

She looked up at him at that statement. Bucky noticed his hand was still in hers.

"Love, you say?"

"It will go in full circle and bring you all the way back here."

Bucky laughed at that statement.

"If I didn't know any better, doll, I'd say you were trying to flirt with me."

Esma smirked, still not letting go of him.

"You wish. But no, I am not talking about me. It does not seem to happen for quite a long time, from what I see."

"And how would you know that?" He asked, a playful edge to his voice.

She looked at his hand and followed an invisible line from it to the sky.

"My family has a gift. We see things others might not be able to usually see. We know how to use divinatory arts like tarot or tea leaves, and some of us have the Sight. My mother sees auras. I see threads. There is an old legend in the further eastern parts of Asia, where a god tied soulmates together with a red thread. Yours is still gray and reaches to the sky. Your soulmate hasn't been born yet."

Now that was just plain crazy. A thread that connected him to his soulmate? Who was not born yet? What kind of crap was that? How much younger did Esma think that hypothetical soulmate would be?

"You don't have to believe me just yet. After all, you barely believe any of my readings, even if whatever I predicted came true. Clearly," she commented, looking at the enlistment papers sticking out of the pocket at his chest. "However, all will happen in due time."

She let go of his hand, signaling the end of the reading.

"No need," Esma assured as he reached for the money in his pocket. "This one is on the house."

_oOo_

Bucky was wandering about after the Stark Expo, Steve nowhere to be seen, and the two girls who accompanied him both safely home. He had, at least, made sure of that. The streets were still bustling with activity, and his steps took him all the way back to Coney Island, where some sort of fair seemed to be going on. His eyes wandered over the acrobats and the sword eaters and they settled on a booth with a familiar face. Laughing at the performers' antics, and dressed in a rather stereotypical fortune teller outfit, Esma looked up to cross his eyes. Throwing him a radiant smile, she beaconed him towards her area. Smiling back, Bucky joined her in a few long strides.

"Having fun?" He asked.

"Lots. Where are you coming from?"

"The Stark Expo in Queens. Seems like I've lost my friend, though."

"Oh, I'm sure he will come find you when you need him to the most," she mysteriously answered.

"Uh-uh. No readings, tonight. Just enjoying the fair."

The psychic laughed, the sound chiming like silver bells in the wind.

"Alright, then, just enjoying the fair."

They watched and laughed, occasionally stopping when someone approached the booth for a reading and went right back to it as soon as Esma was done imparting her wisdom to the poor soul who had sought her services. She did not pack up until about two in the morning, while the fair was still going on.

"It's pretty late, doll, aren't you afraid of going home alone?"

"I live very close to here, I should be alright."

"I'm still walking you back. You never know what could happen."

Esma's clear silver bell laugh echoed as she shook her head at his antics, but she allowed it.

"Fine, Captain!"

"Actually, I'm a Sergeant."

She just smiled cryptically at him before taking the arm he offered. They walked in silence for a while.

"So, when are you shipping off?"

"Tomorrow morning. England."

"Tomorrow, huh? Shouldn't you be asleep?"

"Frankly, I wouldn't be able to. So, when I saw you at that fair, it seemed appropriate to delay my bedtime."

His tone was softer now. Esma had always intrigued him, to say the very least, and the fact that she was rather attractive by pretty much anybody's standards did not help. He was already imagining a time after the war where maybe, just maybe…

"I know what you are thinking, Bucky, but I already told you. There is someone destined for you, and that someone is not me."

"It could be," he insisted. "You said she hasn't been born yet. How much older than her would I be? I don't want to meet a child when I'm sixty!"

"Trust the thread, it is never wrong."

"Screw the thread. Why can't we just give this a try?"

"You are shipping off tomorrow, Bucky…"

"And I'll write you."

They had stopped in front of her house now. She looked a bit sad, and somewhat longing, like she wanted the same thing he did. Yet, she was still refusing.

"I like you, doll."

"And you will love her."

She got on the tip of her toes and kissed his cheek.

"It isn't in the cards. I'm sorry."

Esma opened the door to her little house and walked in before closing it behind her. Bucky swore that when he came back, he would do everything he could to prove to her that it could work.

That was the last time he ever saw her.

_oOo_

Bucky absentmindedly walked down the familiar boardwalk in Coney Island for the first time since… well since he had gotten shipped out. Being captured, then falling off the train, being held captive by HYDRA for decades, snapped off for five, and finally back, he has decided to go back to the oh-so-familiar place.

It had changed way too much for his liking. It was way dirtier than he remembered, there were more stores, a few tourists roamed around, and god, had it always been so crowded? When he reached the shack Esma had previously owned, he looked up to see what it had become. He blinked in surprise a few times when he saw the sign. It was exactly the same, with Esma's Psychic Readings still written on it, and the letters showed no damage, suggesting it was not abandoned but cared for. The door displayed a sign that said "Open" with an eye under it. So that's what he did. The bells chimed as the door was pushed open.

"I'll be out in a second!" He heard a female voice say from the back room.

Immediately after, he heard a loud thud followed by a string of curse words both in English and in what seemed to be Turkish, if what his Winter Soldier training had taught him was correct. As promised, she came out a bit later, rubbing her head with a painful grimace on her face. However, she stopped short when she saw him, and it seemed to Bucky like the world was slowing down. She looked almost exactly how Esma did.

Her skin was a bit darker, but she had the same features, and her eyes were a carbon copy of Esma's, which currently looked back and forth from her hand to his.

"Hi," he finally said, his throat dry.

"Hi," she answered, looking at him at last.

"I'm… I'm Bucky…"

"I know… My grandmother spoke of you. She said… she said you would be back here someday…"

"You don't seem freaked out that a friend of your grandmother's looks barely older than you."

"Not if that friend is the Winter Soldier…"

"I feel like that part should scare you."

"Well according to your interviews, your time in Wakanda a few years back took care of the HYDRA brainwash, didn't it?"

There was a silence

"I'm Silaah…"

"It means… to be reunited, doesn't it?"

"It does. Do you speak Turkish?"

"Some."

"My grandmother named me… and refused to tell us why. She said… she said I'd understand someday."

"And do you?"

They looked at each other for a bit before Silaah took a step forward.

"Did she tell you about her gift?" She asked, cocking her head to the side.

"The threads, right?"

"Yes, the threads. It seems… It seems I've inherited that from her. And it also seems like you are at the other end of mine."

"I kinda caught on that, doll."

There was an amused gleam in his eyes, just like her grandmother had described it. She sent a tentative smile his way, to which he responded with a smirk of his own.

"Would you like a reading?" Silaah asked, sitting down.

Bucky didn't answer, merely sitting down on the other side of her, and she grabbed the old deck of hand painted cards Esma had used so long ago, dealing three cards, face down, in front of her. A frown instantly took residence on her forehead as she turned the first one around.

"Your past card shows that here's been a great deal of pain in your life, hasn't there? Something tells me it wasn't just emotional…"

Instinctively, he clutched his metal fist on his lap, his flesh hand resting on his shoulder.

"You've lost almost everything, but your trip has come to an end and now you can finally rest. The card here, in the present position, also signifies the end of a trip, but in the sense of collecting your reward."

There was a slight pause as a faint pink glow decorated her cheek. It made him smile. Clearing her throat, she continued, turning the last one over. The red on her face got darker. The card showed a man and a woman sitting under a tree together, holding hands.

"The Lovers. I believe it's… quite self-explanatory."

Smirking some more, Bucky crossed his arms over his chest.

"I don't know, doll, could you explain a bit more?" He asked playfully, making her flare up again.

Though she looked like Esma and seemed like she might have the same spunk judging from the fire in her eyes, she didn't have the mystique and confident air her grandmother had. Silaah seemed a bit clumsier, and much easier to fluster. But it dawned to him that he didn't mind it. He had liked the mysterious aura radiating from Esma, but like she had assured him, he knew that he would love unsettling Silaah.

"It means you have found harmony, with another person," she answered, trying her best not to sputter.

"Like a soulmate maybe?"

She chuckled. He noticed it didn't quite sound like the bells in her grandmother's laughter. Whatever, it seemed overrated to him now. He liked the way it sounded more down to earth, more human, not like she was the sort of magical, perfect creature Esma seemed to be.

"Yes, like a soulmate. And as a future card, it seems like there is love in your… _near_ future."

There was the spunk, he thought as she threw him a pointed gaze at that last statement.

"Well, would you like to ponder over the implications of this near future over a cup of coffee? It's in the cards, after all," Bucky attempted.

"I mean… if the cards explicitly say so," she shrugged, trying to come off as nonchalant as she could, but unable to hide the growing smile on her lips.

She disappeared to the back room to grab her purse before she flipped the "Open" sign on the front door and locked it. Then, both headed out.

Soon, they were talking and laughing like they had done so forever. He hated how cliché it sounded to his own ears, but it seemed like they had known each other before they had even met. Everything seemed so natural, from the way he had pulled her chair for her at the little coffee shop she had dragged him into, and to how they joked around, Silaah finally getting used to him enough to not be nervous though he still managed to make her blush, and finally how her hand had rested on his when they left, not even flinching when she grabbed his metal one. Bucky intertwined their fingers, not minding it one bit.

* * *

_Hi y'all!_

_Just some Bucky fluff I've been thinking about for a bit. The main idea of "I liked your relative back in my time and you look just like her" isn't the most original, I'll admit, but I wanted to contribute because what the hell. _

_Enjoy, leave a review, and I'll see you guys at the next one!  
_

_Maddie_


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